Industry Updates

Stiff competition in the Frewin, McCall and Joel Mervis awards

24 Mar 2011

The Frewin, McCall and Joel Mervis
awards, championed by the Newspaper Association of South Africa, have been in
existence for a collective 120 years and recognise newspaper excellence in advertising,
printing and production, layout and typography as well as a balanced use of
pictures and graphics.

Judges were tasked with reviewing full copies of newspapers published in 2010
and 2011 and selecting the best in three categories of newspapers – urban
dailies with a circulation above 50,000, urban dailies with a circulation below
50,000 and urban weeklies. The competition seeks to encourage and recognise
publishers who excel in producing quality newspapers.

Commenting on the influence of technology on newspaper production, convenor
Clive Loxton, creative faculty head of the AAA School of Advertising, said,
“With several teams having reworked the ‘look’ of their offerings, it is
obvious that computer programmes are having a major effect on the craft.
However, the computer is just a sophisticated tool; the main benefit of which
is to speed things up and make things easier to achieve. It will never replace
the ‘eye’ of a craftsman.”

Finalists in the McCall award
category, which honours urban daily newspapers with a circulation of 50,000 or
less, are:

Die Volksblad

The Mercury

Commended: Daily News and The Witness

The Joel Mervis category,
recognising urban weekly newspapers irrespective of their circulation, yielded
the following finalists:

City Press

Mail & Guardian

Commended: Naweek Beeld, Rapport and
Sunday Independent

Loxton was supported during the judging process by Linda Rademan, lecturer at
AAA School of Advertising; Logan Naidu, learnerships and apprenticeships
specialist at MAPPP-SETA; and Tebogo Serobatse, head of department at the
National Electronic Media Institute of South Africa (NEMISA).

The winners will be announced at the Mondi Shanduka Newspaper Awards ceremony
at Turbine Hall in Johannesburg on 10 May.

Clive Loxton, convenor of judges,
with fellow judge, Linda Rademan

Logan Naidu of MAPPP-SETA, going through one of the entries

Tebogo Serobatse of NEMISA, sorting through some of the entries

The full panel of judges (standing, left to right) – Logan Naidu and
Clive Loxton; with Tebogo Serobatse and Linda Rademan both seated

For Twitter updates, follow @MondiShanduka.

Interviews
with members of the judging panel, as well as photographs of the judging
session, are available on request.

Queries:Issued by Frog Communications on behalf of Mondi Shanduka Newsprint and the
Newspaper Association of South Africa.